# Comparing Four Passwordless SSH Authentication Methods

DevFeed: [Comparing Four Passwordless SSH Authentication Methods](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/ssh-authentication-methods-which-is-best-29610.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://goteleport.com/blog/comparing-passwordless-ssh-authentication-methods/>)

Author: sakshyam.shah@goteleport.com (Sakshyam Shah)

Published: 2022-02-11T00:00:00Z

Content type: comparison

Language: en

Sources: [Teleport](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/teleport.md>)

Topics: [ssh](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ssh.md>), [OpenSSH](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/openssh.md>), [Authentication](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/authentication.md>), [passwords](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/passwords.md>), [certificates](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/certificates.md>), [Cryptography](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/cryptography.md>)

Tags: [authentication](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/authentication.md>), [blog](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/blog.md>), [certificates](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/certificates.md>), [digital-signatures](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/digital-signatures.md>), [openssh](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/openssh.md>), [passwords](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/passwords.md>), [private-key](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/private-key.md>), [public-key](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/public-key.md>), [ssh](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ssh.md>)

## AI overview

This article compares four passwordless SSH authentication methods: key-based, certificate-based, host-based, and out-of-band authentication through a custom PAM module. It explains how SSH key authentication works and discusses its setup, scalability, rotation, and stolen-key considerations.

## Source excerpt

This blog post compares four different passwordless authentication methods for SSH: SSH keys, certificates, host-based, and PAM modules.